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Sunday, September 30

BarackandMichelle Obama, Bill Gates, Oprah Winfrey, Donald Trump, Jackie Chan, Michael Jordan, Taylor Swift, Queen Elizabeth II, Hillary Clinton and Chinese leader, Xi Jinping are among the favourite names topping the world’s list of famous persons from an international survey conducted in 2018 Once again, Gates and Angelina Jolie emerge as the world’s most admired man and woman in YouGov’s annual study.Every time YouGov conducts a survey, Gates tops the list while Jolie also comes first in each of the three surveys since 2015 during which time separate male and female categories were introduced, YouGov reports.In the US, former President Barack Obama and former First Lady Michelle Obama top the lists. In 2018, the study was expanded to cover the views of people in 35 countries which invariably means that YouGov interviewed over 37,000 people to come up with the list.

The female top twenty was dominated by entertainers, with 14 of the most admired women being actresses, singers or TV presenters (although some, like Emma Watson and Angelina Jolie, are also notable for their humanitarian work). On the part of the male, the list of most admired men contains more people from political, business and sporting circles. Barack and Michelle Obama occupy the two-second place spots, which stands for a three-position rise for Michelle and nothing new for Obama.

The 44th US president is 15 places above the man that replaced him, with Donald Trump rising one place since the last study. In fact, the last US president ranks higher than the incumbent in all countries surveyed bar one: Russia. The results are calculated from the combination of responses to two questions – whether a respondent admires the figure at all and then whether they are the figure the respondent admires the most. Each nation’s results in the global compilation are also weighted to represent the country’s population size. (Full methodology is available below) Thirteen Americans – six men and seven women – make the list.

While Gates and Obama hold on to their spots from last year, Donald Trump and Warren Buffett, two figures lauded for their business acumen, improved their ranks from last year. The list also introduced two male newcomers, Elon Musk and Michael Jordan. Many of the women, except Hillary Clinton, also see improvements in their ranks.

In the list of global-only figures, Obama ranks first in 19 nations, compared to only 6 for Bill Gates. However, as the former president performs relatively poorly in populous countries like China (7th) and Russia (12th), Gates, who places in the top four in every country listed, takes the top spot.

Chinese leader Xi Jinping and Chinese actor Jackie Chan have swapped places since 2016, with Chan now occupying the third place spot and Jinping in fourth. This is a result of Jackie Chan’s more universally favourable international profile: while Xi Jinping is by far the most admired man in China, Chan’s global reach is just enough to push him above the premier. Oprah Winfrey, the TV host, moves up one position to be the third most admired woman in the world, leapfrogging Queen Elizabeth II and Hillary Clinton who have fallen to fourth and fifth place respectively.

Of those public figures who remain in the global top 20 from last time, Emma Watson has seen the largest rise in the rankings climbing from 13th in 2016 to sixth this year. Also experiencing noticeable boosts are American singer Taylor Swift (from 14th to ninth) and Chinese business magnate Jack Ma (from 10th to fifth).

In December 2017 YouGov gathered open-ended nominations from panellists across 35 countries, asking them simply: “Thinking about people alive in the world today, which [man or woman] do you most admire?” These nominations were then used to compile a list of the 20 men and 20 women who received the most nominations and were nominated in at least four countries. An additional 10 popular local figures were added to the lists for individual countries.

Let this be a lesson to all of us. Sweat, leggings and a fresh fake tan = recipe for utter disaster. Yet, we cannot stop laughing at how relatable this is. Eve Mallon from Falkirk, Scotland, decided to save herself time by applying her fake tan before she hit the gym. Little did she know that what she was doing to "save time" would end up costing her more time. After her quick gym sesh, Eve quickly realised she was LITERALLY branded by Adidas with the logo causing her to sweat off tan in that exact area. She shared a pic of the ordeal to Twitter showing off her new "leg tattoo" and it is beyond funny. Capturing the photo "that's the last time I will work out with tan on btw", the picture has got over 3,000 retweets and 33,000 likes. In fairness this is bloody gas, we just hope "Adidas" was well covered before the night out.

He's at it again! Kanye West out Kanye-ed himself last night when he threw shapes on national TV whilst dressed as a Perrier Water bottle.

The usually serious star looked to be having the time of his life as he performed I Love It with Lil Pump and Adele Givens, grinning like the kid that got the candy. And that was after he arrived in a car decked out like a slide show. Needless to say, no-one knew what to make of it.

"Didn't know if this was a skit or a performance," commented one viewer, while another declared, "This is so bad it's hilarious!﻿"'If Kanye dancing around in a giant Perrier bottle isn’t a meme, idk what is," remarked a fan, before one lamented, "I just watched two and a half minutes of two grown men in water bottles dancing and singing on stage.﻿"That certainly wasn't the only strange antic Kanye flopped out, with the star getting booed after delivering a pro-Trump speech.

Chris Rock was sat in the audience and managed to capture his outburst on camera.

The heartbreaking moment an elephant mother spends more than 24 hours trying to revive its dead calf. the heartbreaking moment an elephant mother spends more than 24 hours trying to revive its dead calfFootage shows the grieving mother moving around the limp, lifeless body of the baby elephant in the village of Tumkur, India on 26 September. Villagers and forest officials tried to separate the two by making loud noises and setting off firecrackers, but the mother stuck by its child's sideThe grief-striA group of another 12 elephants was spotted nearby consoling the mother. Eventually, the pair were separated.

The Karnataka state has one of the highest concentrations of elephants in India, with the state boasting a population of 6,049, according to the 2017 Elephant Census. The mother pushes around the limp calf with her trunk as she tries to wake her baby.

A four-year-old boy plunged to his death after his older brother threw him off the roof of an apartment building, it is claimed. The youngster, named locally as Shimon Smith, was found unconscious and unresponsive in a courtyard outside the block of flats in the early hours of Saturday. He died at the scene after officers were called to the tragic incident in Brooklyn, New York, around 3.30am.His 20-year-old brother, who has a history of schizophrenia, has been arrested, according to reports. Sources told CBS New York that the older brother has confessed to throwing Shimon off the building in Brooklyn's East Midwood neighbourhood. Marc Liverman, the building's landlord, told the TV news station he woke up to find a lot of police officers outside. He added: “It’s very sad, sad, sad."

Police and paramedics raced to the scene after someone called 911 to report that the boy had been injured in a fall. He had been thrown off the roof to his death, tweeted WABC-TV reporter Marcus Solis. Local news reports said the boy's 20-year-old brother had a history of schizophrenia. Shimon's brother remained in custody and no charges have been laid. The investigation continues.

A baby who suffered dire injuries when he plunged 40ft from a window on to a pavement has made a full recovery. Anwar Nyanzi was 11 months old when he got on a chair while his aunt’s back was turned, hoisted himself on to a window ledge at the block of flats and fell out. With severe brain and spinal injuries, he had what was said to be a one per cent chance of survival. But he somehow began breathing unaided again and was standing up within weeks of the fall. His mum Hawa Rutansingwa said: “It was nothing short of a miracle. He pulled through despite having gone through the stuff of nightmares.”

She collapsed when she arrived at the scene of the accident and saw him.

Hawa, 32, said: “His head was like a balloon. One of his eyes was almost popping out of his head..“But he proved himself a fighter.”Anwar fell from his aunt Fauzia’s third-floor flat in Croydon, South London, while Hawa was at work. Fauzia was sickened when she noticed Anwar had vanished and saw him motionless on the ground. She phoned 999 and called Hawa who rushed there too. Over four days in intensive care at St George’s Hospital in Tooting, Anwar had brain surgery and treatment for broken ribs and arms. Hawa, who works in the healthcare sector, said: “I went with my brother and mother to kiss my son goodbye... It was horrible.”Anwar’s dad, who lives in Uganda, made arrangements to fly to Britain to say farewell too. Mum-of-three Hawa said the moment her lad astonished everyone by breathing for himself was “indescribable”.Doctors warned that Anwar was likely to be severely disabled but he can see, hear and move normally after intensive physiotherapy. He went home two months after the fall in July last year.And the lad, now two, has continued his astonishing recovery at the family home in Purley, South London, to the delight of his four-year-old brother and sister who is five.Hawa does not blame her sister Fauzia for the accident, adding that Anwar’s return to health has been so complete “you would never know what he has been through”.

A skull-shaped asteroid which has earned the nickname of 'Great Pumpkin' is set to fly past Earth just after Halloween. The comet was first named after the spooky vegetable by scientists at NASA, after it flew past Earth on October 31, 2015. Officially called the TB1456 asteroid, it came as close as 300,000 miles away from the planet back in 2015 or 1.3 times the distance of the moon from Earth.It will be heading back this way on November 11 but is expected to be even further away and pass by at around 24 million miles away. This is about a quarter of the distance between the Earth and the sun. The asteroid has been described as a "death comet" because it's believed to be a dead comet but also because of its unusual skull-like shape. First spotted by NASA's Infrared Telescope Facility (IRTF) in Manua Kea, Hawaii, it's unnerving features were revealed on detailed radar images taken by the Arecibo Observatory in Puerto Rico. In 2015, NASA said the comet was approximately 200ft (600 metres) in diameter.

At the time, Kelly Fast, IRTF program scientist at NASA, said: "The IRTF data may indicate that the object might be a dead comet, but in the Arecibo images it appears to have donned a skull costume for its Halloween flyby."Dr James Richardson, a scientist for the Universities Space Research Association, said: "The bright and dark features are an indication of surface irregularities."For example, the central dark feature may be a large circular depression, possibly an impact crater.

"Vishnu Reddy, a research scientist at the Planetary Science Institute in Arizona, said: "We found that the object reflects about six per cent of the light it receives from the sun."This is similar to fresh asphalt, and while here on earth we that that is pretty dark, it is brighter than a typical comet which reflects only three to five per cent of the light."That suggests it could be cometary in origin but as there is no coma evident, the conclusion is that it is a dead comet.

Around this time, fashion lovers drop everything to go to the world’s fashion capital, New York, Milan, London and Paris to check out the latest trends and exclusive creations from world-renowned designers.It is also at this same time that African cities are planning their own national events to showcase designers and fashion houses- established and upcoming- at fashion weeks. The events, most of which usually take place from October offer an array of opportunities for fashion lovers and designers to buy and present their work respectively. Manyhave asked how influential these events are considering that fashion is still seen as a struggling industry on the continent and that designers have had to use internationally known platforms and celebrities to showcase their work. Nevertheless, for many designers, fashion events are the stage onto which some of their creative works get noticed even on a small-scale.

Saturday, September 29

In Iraqi 22-year-old Instagram star modelTara Fares who lived in Erbil, the capital of Iraqi Kurdistan, was shot dead in central Baghdad on Thursday has resulted in a commotion on social media. She was shot at when she was driving in her Porsche convertible through Camp Sarah district in Baghdad. Fares was a fashion trend-setter with a following of 2.7 million. She used to post pictures of her where she sported her tattoos, clothes, hair colours among other things on Instagram. One of the Twitter users said that she fell victim because of her lifestyle and fame. "I am beyond disappointed and hurt after hearing about another tragic loss in Iraq. Tara Fares, a model and social media influencer was gunned down in broad daylight in #Baghdad," said another user. "A young Iraq model was simply enjoying & loving life like other pretty girls. Unfortunately, she got shot & killed by few militants. I am truly heartbroken & saddened by such a tragic news," read another comment. Fans began posting across social media after her death was confirmed, with many celebrating her outspokenness in a country that can still have conservative attitudes towards women.

“Tara’s death screams discrimination, lack of freedom and rights,” wrote one fan. “Sympathy is not enough

Another tweet came out asking, "This Thursday it was Tara... Next Thursday, who will it be?" An Iraqi satirist, who has been living in exile in Jordon following death threats, Ahmad al-Basheer, condemned the killing. According to news agency AFP, Fares was based in Iraqi Kurdistan. Ahmad said, "Anyone who finds excuses for those who kill a girl just because she had decided to live like most other girls on the planet is an accomplice to her murder." Ms Fares’ body was taken to Baghdad’s Sheikh Zaid hospital at 5.45am local time. Doctors told local media she had died after suffering three bullet wounds. Iraqi Foreign Minister has ordered a probe into the murder.

The Ankara fabric is the rave around the world right now, not only in Africa. The unique blend of patterns and colours is attractive and exquisite to the eyes, and it has certainly caught the eyes of foreign celebrities around the world. American celebrities have shown that they can mix and blend with style and trends and go with the flow. Below are 11 foreign celebrities that have shown good taste in Ankara styling:

1. Gwen Stefani is a fan of Ankara and she looks great in this simple gown.

2. Gabrielle Union wears an Ankara cropped top and skirt.

3. Solange Knowles looks good in this Ankara shirt and shorts.

4. Rihanna matches her Ankara with a shirt, looking corporate and chic.

5. Former Glee star Amber Riley is beautiful in this simple Ankara gown.

Reubenson Chinthuli, an 83-year-old Malawian man on Wednesday, pleaded with Thyolo Third Grade Magistrate Court to divorce his 26-year-old wife over domestic violence.According to reports, Chinthuli told the court that Zone Kwatani, whom he wedded a year ago, has been assaulting him on different occasions.“This woman denies me food. She usually comes late at night without proper explanation. At times when she comes during such late hours, she beats and threatens to kill me with a knife. On one occasion, she pierced a knife on my hand. Please, your worship, save me from this wicked woman. She will kill me,” pleaded Chihuly. However, Khatami denied the claims saying her love for her husband was genuine and that she never for once dreamt of any divorce.“This is my husband and the divorce won’t happen. He should just amend his ways because he is also greedy,” said Khatami.

THOUSANDS of angry Britons have signed a petition to demand that the Royal Family pay for Princess Eugenie and Jack Brooksbank’s Wedding on October 12. Princess Eugenie and Jack Brooksbank will tie the knot on October 12, but outraged taxpayers are calling for the "House of Commons to urge the Government to commit no public money to the wedding”.They are also calling on the Government to “publish a report of all costs to taxpayers”.The petition was launched by Republic, a campaign group which works to build support for the abolition of the monarchy. In full, the petition reads: ”This petition calls upon the House of Commons to urge the Government to ensure the highest standards of openness and transparency relating to the funding of Princess Eugenie and Jack Brooksbank's wedding, commit no public funds to the wedding and to publish a report of all costs to taxpayers.”Taxpayers were outraged when it was revealed Princess Eugenie’s wedding will cost the public in the region of £2million, most of which will be spent on security.The Royal Family is expected to pay for the rest of the wedding and the reception costs.When Meghan Markle and Prince Harry married in May, it was reported the wedding cost in excess of £35million. Around £31million of this sum was spent on security. The price of Royal weddings allegedly covers officers' overtime pay, holiday cancellations, and requests for extra patrols. The security at the Duke and Duchess of Sussex’s wedding was believed to include rooftop snipers, undercover police officers and a “drone destroyer”.A Republic spokesperson said: “Charging one royal wedding to the taxpayer is bad enough, but two costly Royal weddings this year is crossing a line.“Royal spending is out of control, and taxpayers have a right to know how their money is being spent.“If the Royals want to use Eugenie and Jack’s big day to shore up support for the monarchy, they have to cover the costs security and all.“Two-thirds of the public wasn’t interested in Harry and Meghan’s big day, and polls suggest support for the monarchy is flimsy at best, yet the Royals have planned another costly wedding, confident their spending will never be held to account. That has to change."Public services are being cut, and councils are struggling. Why are we footing the wedding bills for the richest family in the country?

Some 50 million accounts in Facebook have been hacked due to a security flaw, revealed Friday, the social network, to the image and finances, already seriously shaken by several controversies, particularly around the protection of personal data. Yet another blunder for the network to 2.2 billion users, which has pushed back the title to Wall Street, which ended down 2.59% to 164,46 dollars.“The fault has been repaired yesterday (Thursday) evening”, said Friday the boss of Facebook Mark Zuckerberg, in a conference call with reporters to provide an update on the situation.“We do not know if these accounts have been used in a malicious way”, he explained, adding that investigations were underway to find out what exactly the hackers had had access to and what they had done. According to Facebook, “nearly 50 million accounts have been affected directly”, that is to say that the attackers were able to access their information on their profiles (names, gender, city…), thanks to the hacking of the feature to “See as”, to look at his own profile as if it was another user. This revelation is yet another ball at the foot of the group and its all powerful CEO, who has already had to face this week the departure surprise of the two officers of its subsidiary, Instagram, against a background of conflict with the house mother. “Sorry” Mark Zuckerberg has explained that the flaw had been discovered on Tuesday: “an attacker has exploited a technical vulnerability to steal access tools allowing them to stay in the account Facebook of about 50 million accounts,” he said. These keys (“tokens” in English) allow you to reconnect automatically to his account. To the best knowledge of Facebook, that “works” with the FBI, the attackers were able to access data contained in the profiles, but without that, they would know what they had done or were doing. Hackers “have been able to use the account as if they were the owners”, noted Guy Rosen, in charge of the “Management product”.“We are sorry”, he added, specifying not to know who was behind the attack. For all that, according to initial findings, the pirates do have, it seems, not used this flaw to make publications on the hacked accounts, or gain access to private messages. The passwords have not been compromised, nor that your credit card information, assured the company. For the time being, Facebook has suspended the feature to “See as”, and has disconnected the 50 million accounts hacked, leading their owners to have to connect again. Facebook has extended this far, “as a precaution”, with 40 million of additional accounts, including the feature “View as” has been used recently. Hacking this “shows once again that we are in an arms race,” with “constant attacks” designed to steal information,” said Mark Zuckerberg. Confidence-hacked It is a new misfortune the severity of which remains to be determined precisely for the first social network in the world, which accumulates controversy and criticism for almost two years. Rohit Chopra, a member of the agency of the regulator in u.s. commerce (FTC),has simply asked for the “answers” via his Twitter account.“Enough is enough”, responded the association for the defence of digital rights Fight for the Future, calling on elected officials to legislate. These last few months especially, the users ‘ confidence has already been seriously shaken by several scandals and Facebook crosses the most serious crisis of its (young) history. The group is criticized to have been used as a platform of political manipulation, especially during the American presidential campaign of 2016, or to have let that slip the data of tens of millions of users without their knowledge to the British firm Cambridge Analytica.Despite the apology repeated by its leader, including before u.s. Congress, the image of Facebook, born in 2004, has emerged largely tarnished. And while the scandals had long spared her finances, the giant has seen a sudden tobacco stock unissued in July after it announced a quarterly revenue and a number of users judged to be disappointing. In addition to these scandals, Facebook had warned there have already been two years that the exponential growth might one day or the other to slow down. After including Yahoo or even Uber which has paid off this week with a heavy fine the theft of massive personal data is not saving the giants of technology.

Woman's Hour Power List 2018 released its top 40 most influential women in music and a Nigerian made the list. Her name is Chinyere Adah Nwanoku, OBE (born June 1956, London). She is a double Bass player and professor of Historical Double Bass Studies at the Royal Academy of Music. She was a founder member and principal bassist of the Orchestra of the Age of Enlightenment, a position she held for 30 years.

See the Top 10 below...

1. Beyoncé

2. Taylor Swift

3. Vanessa Reed (PRS for Music)

4. Adele

5. Stacey Tang (MD of RCA Records)

6. Gillian Moore (Director of music at Southbank Centre)

7. Rebecca Allen (President of Decca Records)

8. Marin Alsop

9. Chi-chi Nwanoku

10. Maggie Crowe (Director of events at BPI)

Beyoncé came first in a list of the industry's 40 most influential women, thanks to her feminism, activism and empowering musical messages.Taylor Swift, Adele and Dua Lipa were also included on the power list, which was unveiled as part of BBC Music Day.

The top 40 didn't just recognise big-sellers and global stars, making room for the unsung heroes who work behind the scenes to champion women. Third place went to Vanessa Reed who, as director of the PRS Foundation, has persuaded dozens of festivals to sign up to a 50:50 gender balance on their line-ups by 2022. The top 10 also includes Marin Alsop, who became the first female conductor to lead the Last Night of the Proms in 2013, and Chi-chi Nwanoku, who founded Europe's first professional majority black and minority ethnic orchestra, Chinese.

David Zinn has been creating original artwork in and around Ann Arbor, Michigan since 1987. For more than twenty years, he freelanced for a wide variety of commercial clients while simultaneously sneaking “pointless” art into the world at large. His professional commissions included theatrical posters, business logos, educational cartoons, landfill murals, environmental superheroes, corporate allegories and hand-painted dump trucks, and his less practical creations involved bar coasters, restaurant placemats, cake icing, and snow. Now, thanks to the temptations of a box of sidewalk chalk on an unusually sunny day, Mr Zinn is known all over the world for the art he creates under his feet. David’s temporary street drawings are composed entirely of chalk, charcoal and found objects, and are always improvised on location through a process known as “pareidolic anamorphosis” or “anamorphic pareidolia.” Most of his creatures appear on sidewalks in Michigan, but many have surfaced as far away as subway platforms in Manhattan, village squares in Sweden and street corners in Taiwan. He has achieved global notoriety through sharing on the pages of Facebook, Instagram, Huffington Post, Graffiti Art Magazine, Bored Panda, Central China Television, Street Art Utopia, and Archie McPhee’s Endless Geyser of Awesome. His most frequent characters are Sluggo (a bright green monster with stalk eyes and irreverent habits) and Philomena (a phlegmatic flying pig), but the diversity of Mr Zinn’s menagerie seems to be limited only by the size of the sidewalk and the spirit of the day.